Genesis 19:6-20:18

Then we saw how Lot showed hospitality to these strangers and took them into his home to stay the night but the homosexual crowd demanded that Lot release the visitors to them so that they could sexually assualt them.

Now we see the outcome of that whole sordid incident and we see the final result of these evil cities. I’m sure most of us will see the similarities to Sodom and Gomorrah in our own society today.

For a recap let’s start today at Genesis 19:4-5 again,  But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both old and young, all the people from every quarter. 

And they called to Lot, and said to him, Where are the men which came in to you this night? Bring them out to us, that we may know them. The crowd wanted to have homosexual relations with Lot’s visitors.

This is a sickening scene that reveals the degradation of this city of Sodom.

When Lot went down into the city of Sodom, he didn’t realise what kind of city it was. He got down there and found out that perversion was the order of the day, and he brought up his children, his sons and daughters, in that atmosphere.

Earlier in Genesis when he’d pitched his tent toward Sodom, he looked down there and had seen the beauty of the area and its potential for his livestock. He would have seen the folk as they were on the outside, but he hadn’t seen what they really were. The sin of this city is so great that God is now going to judge it. God is going to destroy the city.

Let’s draw a sharp line here. There is a new attitude toward sin today. There’s this igrey area where sin is not really sin as we once thought it was. The church has compromised until it’s pitiful, even to the point of homosexual ministers.

The idea today seems to be that you can become a child of God and continue on in sin. God says that’s impossible, you simply can’t do that, and this city of Sodom is an example of that fact.

Paul asks the question: “Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?” And the answer is “God forbid,” or, Let it not be. That’s Romans 6:1-2. The idea that you can be a Christian and go on in sin is a tremendous mistake, especially to make light of it, and accept it as good and normal as is being done in this case.

This is what they were doing in Sodom and Gomorrah and God destroyed these cities.

Now if we don’t believe in God and His justice and we believe there’s no judgment of sin then just carry on doing what you like, however, you’d better be absolutely sure you’re right!

And don’t say that we have a primitive old fashioned view of God in Genesis and we have a better, more enlightened and modern view today.

We need to grasp a reality that even many churches today have not grasped. That reality is that society’s views of what’s right and wrong may change, political views may change, the education system’s views may and even the church’s views may change but GOD NEVER CHANGES. He’s the same yesterday, today and forever. What He judged so harshly in the past He’ll judge again in the future. We must never lose sight of this. We can’t argue that Jesus received sinners so it’s alright to live any way we choose. He certainly did, but when He got through with them, He’d changed them. The harlot who came to Him was no longer in that business. When she came to God, she changed. That is the thing that happened to other sinners. A publican came to Him, and he left the seat of customs. He gave up that which was crooked when he came to the Lord. If you have come to Christ, you will be changed. Many people write and try to explain to me that we are living in a new day and I need to wake up. My friend, we are living in a new day, but it just happens to be Sodom and Gomorrah all over again.

To Genesis 19:6-7 now,   So Lot went out to them through the doorway, shut the door behind him, and said, “Please, my brethren, do not do so wickedly! 

The men of Sodom were outside the door, asking that these guests in the home of Lot be turned over to them. Lot said, “Please, my brethren, do not do so wickedly.” Lot has fallen so low that he even identifies with them as brothers.

That is the way Lot looked at it, He’d been down there in Sodom a long time. But despite how low Lot had fallen he did not see the sin of these men as a kind of new morality. It was just old sin and it was wicked in Lot’s eyes

This was the consequence of Lot’s having settled in the midst of a godless and wicked people. Lot, having gone out and locked the door behind him in order to protect his guests, confronted a mob that had gone crazy with unnatural lust. His plea, in which he begged them not to act in such a wicked manner, fell on deaf ears.

To Genesis 19:8  See now, I have two daughters who have not known a man; please, let me bring them out to you, and you may do to them as you wish; only do nothing to these men, since this is the reason they have come under the shadow of my roof.” 

Lot was willing to sacrifice his own two daughters to this mob, their virginity and all. He was willing to turn his own two daughters over to the mob that they might do what they would to his two daughters, and yet seeking to protect the two men who are strangers to him.

The men of Sodom showed a shocking demonstration of depravity, but we’re just as shocked at the willingness of Lot to give up his daughters to the mob as we are at the sinful desire of the mob itself.

Lot’s offer to the mob was horrible and can’t be justified even when we consider the low place of women in the pre-Christian world and the very high place of any guest in one’s home. Under the sacred obligations of hospitality, it was often understood that a guest was to be protected more than one’s own family.

This was a difficult argument for Lot to make. He and the men of Sodom had a completely different standard for deciding what was wicked and what was not. The men of Sodom thought they were pursuing pleasure, and didn’t care a lick that Lot thought it was wicked.

More and more in today’s world the guide for sexual morality is to simply do as one pleases to act on what feels good.

Verse 9  And they said, “Stand back!” Then they said, “This one came in to stay here, and he keeps acting as a judge; now we will deal worse with you than with them.” So they pressed hard against the man Lot, and came near to break down the door. 

“And they said again, This one fellow came in to stay here, and he keeps acting like a judge: …” You see, Lot was advancing in the political arena there. These men are in effect saying, “Look at this bloke. He came to us for a stopover and now he wants to be a political power over us and have us do what he thinks is right. Let’s do even worse to him than we’re going to do with his visitors.

Verses 10 and 11,  But the men (that’s the visitors) reached out their hands and pulled Lot into the house with them, and shut the door. 

And they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they became weary trying to find the door.  

If Lot’s guests had not done this, both they and Lot would have been destroyed, because that was the intention of the men of Sodom.

Now we move to Genesis 19:12-14, Then the men (that’s the angels) said to Lot, “Have you anyone else here? Son-in-law, your sons, your daughters, and whomever you have in the city—take them out of this place! 

For we will destroy this place, because the outcry against them has grown great before the face of the LORD, and the LORD has sent us to destroy it.” 

So Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law, who had married his daughters, and said, “Get up, get out of this place; for the LORD will destroy this city!” But to his sons-in-law he seemed to be joking. 

Lot’s in a very bad situation.

He’d spent years in the city of Sodom and he’d learned to tolerate this sort of thing, even though he recognises it as wickedness.

He had seen his sons and daughters grow up, and they’d apparently married among people with those ethical standards.

When Lot got this word from the Lord to leave the city, he went to his sons–in–law and said, “Let’s get out of here. God is going to destroy this city.” They laughed at him and ridiculed him.

Just the same as the people you and I try to warn about God’s plan for this world they took his warning as nothing more than a big joke.

This man was out of the will of God in this place, and he had no witness for God. When we go down to the level of the world around us, my friend, we don’t influence them for good. We don’t show them the Lord. We just become one of them and then when we do speak we have very little or no credibility.

If it weren’t for 2 Peter 2:6 to 8, which we read before, we’d think that this man Lot wasn’t saved, but remember according to those verses Lot never enjoyed it down there in Sodom. Now that he is going to leave the city, he can’t get anyone to leave with him except his wife and two single daughters.

This sordid section of Genesis gives us the creeps in it’s many aspects of depravity but in another sense it gives us great joy to know that despite the appalling state that Lot had fallen into he was saved from the terrible day of judgement. Our joy comes from knowing we also have continually failed in our walk with God but despite that He’ll never leave or foresake the one whose trust is in Him and Him alone.

Now we’re in verses 15 and 16,  When the morning dawned, the angels urged Lot to hurry, saying, “Arise, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be consumed in the punishment of the city.” 

And while he lingered, the men took hold of his hand, his wife’s hand, and the hands of his two daughters, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city. 

Notice Lot lingered.

Too much of Lot’s heart was in Sodom, so he didn’t have an urgency to leave the city. A lack of urgency to obey God (even when it’s necessary and good) is a common sign of compromise and a backslidden condition.

Lot was God’s man in spite of everything. As we’ve just said if we only had the Book of Genesis, we’d probably not believe that Lot was saved, but since Peter calls him a righteous man, we know that he was. Lot had become righteous because he’d followed Abraham’s example and he believed God, and he had offered the sacrifices. God extends mercy to Lot, and he now believes God and gets out of the city.

Verses 17 to 19, So it came to pass, when they had brought them outside, that he said, “Escape for your life! Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed.” Then Lot said to them, “Please, no, my lords!

Indeed now, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have increased your mercy which you have shown me by saving my life; but I cannot escape to the mountains, lest some evil overtake me and I die.

Even after all that’s happened Lot didn’t want to leave. He would reluctantly get out of the city, but he couldn’t make it to the mountain.

Verse 20, See now, this city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one; please let me escape there (is it not a little one?) and my soul shall live.” 

This city was a little place called Zoar, and that’s where Lot went. You see, he came out of Sodom, but he didn’t come clean even out of there. And, of course, he got into a great deal of trouble there also.

Poor Lot! He was in the worst of all possible places. He had too much of the world to be happy in the LORD, and too much of the LORD to be happy in the world.

Verses 21 and 22 where Lot is sort of arguing with the Lord.  And he (the Lord) said to him, “See, I have favoured you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. 

Hurry, escape there. For I cannot do anything until you arrive there.” Therefore the name of the city was called Zoar.

Verses 21 and 22 where Lot is sort of arguing with the Lord.  And he (the Lord) said to him, “See, I have favoured you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. 

Hurry, escape there. For I cannot do anything until you arrive there.” Therefore the name of the city was called Zoar.

The angels seemed far more urgent to rescue Lot and his family than they were to be rescued. This is strange, but common in spiritual things.

Lot appears pathetic and whimpering in his prayer, especially in contrast to the boldness of Abraham in Genesis 18.

I cannot do anything until you arrive there says the angel. This answers Abraham’s question, Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? (Genesis 18:25). God, bound by His own righteousness and honour, could not bring this judgment on Sodom until the few righteous people were rescued.

So Lot ends up in this tiny city of Zoar. The name Zoar means small or insignificant.

Gen 19:23  The sun had risen upon the earth when Lot entered Zoar. 

Then the LORD rained brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, from the LORD out of the heavens. 

So He overthrew those cities, all the plain, all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. 

God destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, and we’re told two things, one concerning his wife and the other concerning his daughters. Concerning his wife we read in chapter 19 verse 26  But his wife looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of salt. 

This is an important lesson for us today.

Many of us Christians talk about how we want to see the Lord come, but we’re not living as if we mean it. Especially in the Western world, most have a nice home with a big-screen tv which we watch as if addicted. We have boats, caravans lovely furniture, 2 or 3 cars, and every conceivable trinket.

However, when the Lord comes, my friend, we’re going to leave it all! Everything. Let’s ask ourselves a question. Will it break our hearts to leave all of this down here?

I dare say most of us would love to stay with friends and loved ones whom we want to be with. And then there’s our interests and hobbies that we want to continue. I guess if we’re honest we hope the Lord will just let us stay here a while longer. But don’t we also want to be able to say that when He does call, we’ll not have a thing down here that will break our hearts to leave, not one thing? We love our home so would we be happy to just go off and leave it? How do we feel about that? Mrs Lot turned and looked back, and this is one of the explanations.

The other reason that she looked back is simply that she didn’t believe God.

God had said, “Leave the city, and don’t look back.” Lot didn’t look back; he believed God. But Mrs Lot didn’t believe God. She was not a believer, and so she didn’t really make it out of the city. She was turned to a pillar of salt.

Now, we’re not going to go into the story of Lot’s two daughters in Genesis 19:31-38. It’s as sordid as it can possibly be. Let’s just say that Lot didn’t do well in moving down to the city of Sodom and troubles were his constant companion.

He lost everything except his own soul. His life is a picture of a great many people who will not judge the sins of their own lives and apply 1 John 1:9 to them so they can be clean.

They’re saved, “yet so as by fire.”

The Lord has said in a very definite way that if they’ll not judge their sin down here, He’ll judge it. Apparently, that was the case in Lot’s story.

Let’s conclude this chapter by looking at Abraham. What did Abraham think of all this?

Let’s look at Genesis 19:27-28,  And Abraham went early in the morning to the place where he had stood before the LORD. 

Then he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain; and he saw, and behold, the smoke of the land which went up like the smoke of a furnace. 

When Abraham looked down toward Sodom, he must have been sad.

He probably didn’t know whether or not Lot had escaped. He probably learned about it later on.

When he looked down there, he was more than likely sad for Lot’s sake, but Abraham had not invested a cent down there. When judgment came, it didn’t disturb him a bit because he wasn’t in love with the things of Sodom and the things of the world.

Remember that we’re told in 1 John 2:15, “Do not love the world or the things in the world.”

If we look at Sodom through Lot’s eyes we’d see it as a place where we can be prosperous and have all that our heart desires just like Lot’s view of this world today would be.

If we look at Sodom through Mrs Lot’s eyes we’d fall in love with it. All the glitter and the social scene and the choices to fulfil all that we desire, just like we’d see the world today through her eyes.

If we look at Sodom through Abraham’s eyes we’d see nothing at all to attract us there and we’d have nothing at all invested in this world.

Finally, if we see Sodom through the Lord’s eyes we’d see nothing but sin in its extreme, just as God sees this world. It’s only His Grace and Mercy and His desire that not one be lost that keeps Him from His soon coming judgement.

Much of the church today is not looking at the sin of sodomy as God looks at it.

Political correctness and public opinion have all but covered up God’s view of sexual perversion.

What should the attitude of the Christian be toward homosexuality? Even Lot in his day said, “You are doing wickedly.” And God judged it. As a child of God, we should know that we can’t compromise with this thing. The world indulged in it by first calling it a sickness. Then the world called it normal and a choice that every person has a right to make. It’s a sad fact that today we first overlook evil. Then we permit evil. Then we legalise evil. Then we promote evil. Then we celebrate evil. Then we persecute those who still call it evil.

It’s also vital for us to note that inside every person who practices homosexuality, just as with the thief, the murderer, the liar and the adulterer, there’s a spirit and soul whom God loves so much He gave His Son to die for.

Genesis 19 is a very important chapter for this present generation we’re living in today.

Genesis Chapter 20 is another of those chapters that you’d like to leave out.

In it Abraham repeats the same sin which he committed when he went down into the land of Egypt and lied concerning Sarah, saying, “She is my sister.” It’s the same sordid story, but this chapter is put here for a very important reason.

Abraham and Sarah are going to have to deal with this sin before they can have Isaac, before they can have the blessing.

Until you and I are willing to deal with the sin in our lives, we’ll put a barrier to God’s blessing for us.

Let’s just take the high points of chapter 20.

Genesis 20:1-2  And Abraham journeyed from there to the South, and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur, and stayed in Gerar. 

Now Abraham said of Sarah his wife, “She is my sister.” And Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. 

This is quite interesting. Was Sarah still beautiful? Well, at this time she’s almost ninety years old, and she’s still beautiful. How many of us senior citizens can qualify in this department?

Abraham is getting a long way south in the land. He’s gone beyond Kadesh–Barnea where the children of Israel later came up from Egypt and refused to enter the land.

Abraham has gone down to Gerar, where he lies about Sarah again.

Abraham’s confession makes this chapter important and reveals the fact that Abraham and Sarah can’t have Isaac until they deal with this sin that is in their lives and, of course, it goes way back.

We jump now to Genesis 20:11  And Abraham said, “Because I thought, surely the fear of God is not in this place; and they will kill me on account of my wife. 

Abraham is now talking to Abimelech who is greatly disturbed that Abraham would do a thing like lying about his wife.

Again, Abraham was not trusting God. He felt that he was moving down into a godless place, but he finds out that Abimelech has a high sense of what is right and wrong. Abimelech puts tremendous value upon character and apparently is a man who knows God. Poor old Abraham doesn’t look real good by the side of Abimelech here.

To verse 12  But indeed she is truly my sister. She is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife

Abraham lets it all out. He says, “To tell you the truth Abimalech, it’s only half a lie. Sarah is my half sister, and she is my wife.”

Verse 13,  And it came to pass, when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, that I said to her, ‘This is your kindness that you should do for me: in every place, wherever we go, say of me, “He is my brother.” 

Abraham didn’t have complete confidence and trust in God when they started out, so he and Sarah made a pact that anywhere they went where it looked as if Abraham might be killed because of his wife, Sarah would say that Abraham was her brother.

Abraham and Sarah thought that that would keep Abraham from being killed. They used that pact down in Egypt, and here they’ve used it again.

This sin must be dealt with before God’s going to hear and answer Abraham’s prayer in sending a son.

Isaac will not be born until this is dealt with.

There’s the sin of the lie here but also we see that even after these great and mighty encounters with the Lord Abraham still has trouble believing.

We so often get this picture of Abraham being so far above our puny faith. We see him as the father of faith, which he is, but we also see him many times as just like us. No matter what magnificent revelation we have of God we still fall into unbelief just as Abraham did.

We also see the absolute necessity of judging sin in our own lives, and there is no blessing in their lives? If we would confess our sins and deal with the sins that are in our lives, there’ll be little or no blessing.

Listen to Paul in 1 Corinthians 11:29-32, “But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world.” Blessing is withheld from the church and from the lives of many believers because we will not deal with the sin in our lives. Again 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 

This 20th chapter of Genesis is a tremendous spiritual lesson.